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There are two things I am exceptionally good at, the first thing is singing. I don’t particularly know how I ended up with such a voice, both my parents are basically tone deaf but there it is, and people seem to like my voice, that's the crazy part. Well, some people like my voice, I was pretty used to blocking out the heckling by now though. The second thing i'm exceptionally good at is fucking up my own life like it's a job.
I work at a small coffee shop named La Petite Café, because come on, if I’m going to be a struggling musician, I may as well do it properly, right? So there's my day job at the coffee shop and on weekends there's my spot at the local bar, the Roxy, playing a few of my songs and then working behind the bar serving assholes their drinks. With both jobs i'm able to live what life I wasn’t sacrificing for the greater good of beverage drinkers of every walk of life in relative peace. I'm able to pay my rent and power each month and I don't have to starve too much unless I end up in a freak accident and suddenly have a pile of medical bills to pay or I have a date to pay for. Not that the latter has happened in a long while, in fact in the past few years the former had happened 100% more than any date. I may’ve got hit by a car at one point about a month ago, which resulted in a leg brace. Let me refer you back to the two things I am exceptionally good at point number two. Supposedly it had been my fault, since I was too busy fiddling with my piece of shit phone, but the guy swerved around the corner, he definitely hadn’t been there when I started walking but he was a lawyer so there wasn’t exactly any way I could try and defend myself. I was lucky he didn’t expect me to pay for any damage to the paint on his stupid BMW or something. Thankfully, I was able to keep my jobs but I did indeed have a crazy ass medical bill to pay since I lack the funds for health insurance and for the next few months it would take me about twice as long to get anywhere, stupid damn crutches. I wasn’t exactly starving myself at the moment to try and pay said bills, but my main food group currently was canned spaghetti, or occasionally baked beans on toast.
That’s how I ended up hobbling to work on my crutches before the sun was even out, triple checking every road I crossed just to be safe.
“How long did it take you this morning?” Maud, the other morning barista, asks when I get to the coffee shop just as she is unlocking the door.
“50 minutes, I’m getting better.”
“By the time you’re out of that thing you’ll be able to use crutches like a pro.”
“Too bad I can’t make a career out of that.”
We do our usual morning routine of setting up before we open for the morning rush of businessmen and businesswoman off to a day at the office. A majority of them order black coffee, compared to the lunchtime rush of university students who order chai lattés and iced coffees, they may as well be wearing berets and puking French literature, they are all such indie pricks. As you may have noticed, I don’t have a particular liking for the general population. There were few exceptions to this; Maud is one of them, my parents and my small group of friends are the others. And the cute Mexican boy. Who, without fail, comes in at 2pm on the dot, between the lunchtime rush and the end of school rush. The high schoolers are just as bad as the university pricks. I can't explain what it is about him but the first time I saw him I was practically drooling over the register, all the while trying to take his order without making a fool out of myself. I don’t have a clue what his name is or what he does; all I know is that he is exceptionally fantastic looking and lovely, and that he likes caramel milkshakes. Maud, as she always does, disappears at about five to two to go and clear tables so I could serve the “sexy mexi” as she calls him.
“Ok, it’s been bugging me all month so I’m just going to ask. What happened to your leg?” He asks, leaning against the counter as I make his milkshake.
“If I told you I’d have to kill you.” I tell him without turning around but I hear him laugh and it’s a nice laugh, straight from the heart, not that I would expect any less from him.
“Superman?”
“Batman. But ssh, it’s a secret.”
“Are you going to kill me now?” I hum, pretending to think about it before I shake my head, putting an extra dollop of ice cream in his milkshake, since he is being extra cute today.
“As long as you don’t tell anybody, you can keep your life.”
“Your secret’s safe with me.” He tells me with a smile as I hand over the drink, him smiling brightly at me as he says a ‘thanks’ and ‘goodbye’. As soon as he leaves I call Maud over so I can gush over him, he doesn’t know it but he’s definitely the best part of my days. I guess it’s pretty pathetic if I think about it, so I try my best to keep my swooning for him out of my mind when I leave work and hobble home.
The next day, Mexican boy is not alone, which is strange, because he’s been coming by for a good two years and I have yet to see him come in with anybody else.
“Tony didn’t believe me that Batman made the best milkshakes in town, so I’ve forced him into trying one.”
“You weren’t supposed to tell anybody my secret identity.” I tell him, as I ring up their order.
“Sorry.”
“Too bad I just got hit by a car, no extraordinary superhero here.”
“Keeping the identity safe, gotcha.” His friend, who I guess is named Tony, is staring at me a little weirdly as cute Mexican boy hands me his card.
“Have we met before?” He asks and I shake my head because I’m pretty sure I’d remember meeting an extremely tattooed, pretty good looking Mexican guy. Tony isn’t nearly as good looking as his friend but he is still cute.
“Not that I’m aware of.” I turn my back on them to make the milkshakes, adding an extra dollop of ice cream for both of them, and ok, I possibly come up with an excuse to add extra every time he comes in.
“Oh! Do you play at the Roxy sometimes? Yeah you do, right? I’ve heard you play a few times.” I turn back to them, a big smile on my face because nobody has remembered me before.
“You have?”
“Yeah, man, you have a fantastic voice.”
“Oh, thank you, that’s really nice of you.” I tell him and I’m practically beaming because this is it, I finally have an excuse to see cute Mexican boy outside of the few minutes I see him five days a week.
“You should be finding yourself a record label, not working in this dump.”
“I’m working on it, man, but this place pays the bills until then. But you should come see me this Sunday, both of you.” I say, looking over at him and he beams right back at me and nods his head quickly.
“We’ll definitely be there. I’m Vic, by the way.” He says, sticking out his free hand and I shake it quickly, trying not to blush too hard.
“Kellin.”
“I know.” He says, pointing to my chest. “Name badge.” He knows my name, he’s known my name this whole damn time and finally, after two years I know his. Vic. And Vic was going to come see me play in three days. I want to die of happiness.
“I’ll see you tomorrow then?”
“2pm sharp.”
“If your milkshakes are as good as your voice I’ll see you tomorrow too.” Tony says, waving as they leave and I’m even a bit excited to see him again because he’s nice and he likes my voice and I’m just so happy about everything right now.
“Maud!” I practically scream, glad there’s only a few regular costumers in the store who don’t seem to mind my excitement.
“Calm down, mister. What?”
“His name’s Vic. He brought his friend Tony in, and Tony recognized me from playing at the bar and he said he liked my voice and guess what I did? I told them they should come see me this weekend, and Vic said they’d come.” I did an excited jig, well it was more like a shuffle what with the giant leg brace, but you get the idea.
I’m going between wanting to piss myself and wanting to jump for joy as I have a drink with Maud before I go on. I forced Maud to come along for moral support since I wasn’t sure I was able to do this alone and she had agreed, as long as I bought her a drink.
“Stop freaking out, you do this every weekend.”
“Except I don’t do this every weekend in front of Vic.”
“Tony thought you were great, Vic will too. Now stop being a pussy and get up there.” I moan but did as I was told, climbing up onto the small stage a little awkwardly, taking my beer with me because that shit is expensive and I wasn’t about to leave a single drop in the bottle.
“Hey, I’m Kellin Quinn and I’ll be your entertainment for a bit. No yelling out requests or I’ll cut off your balls, if you want a cover band you’re at the wrong bar.” I tell the half crowded bar, hearing a spattering of laughter but mostly I’m too busy scanning the room in search of Vic. And there he is, sitting at the edge with Tony and a few other guys, staring intently in my direction with a smile. I smile at him when he raises his beer to me in greeting and introduce the first song. I play for an hour before heading off, fairly sweaty and hot but kind of, really happy. Not to mention the fact that i'd managed to convince my boss to give me the night off so I could hopefully chat with Vic a bit. I am definitely going to be a lot shorter on money this week than I usually am but it would be worth it.
"That was awesome. You get better every time I see you, I swear." Maud says when I come off stage, hugging me and handing me a fresh beer.
"You think so? Thanks, Maud." I say just as Vic comes over, a smile that makes his eyes crinkle adorning his face, which admittedly makes me melt a little.
"Dude, that was insane. I can't even– holy shit." He says, letting out a happy sigh and he leans forward and oh ok, Vic and I are hugging. Do I have to let go? "Come hang out with us, ok? Dude, i'm like buzzing from how amazing that was." He says and then sticks out his hand to Maud before I can even reply and I think he may have had a fair bit to drink already because he is seriously hyper.
"I'm Vic, hi."
"I'm Maud, I work with Kellin at the coffee shop."
"You're gonna come hang out with us too, ok?"
"I've just gotta go change my shirt, i'll come find you in a second." I tell them and Maud sends me a little smirk as Vic nods and drags her with him towards his friends. I quickly rush to the back, well as quickly as I can, thanking my boss again for letting me have the night off as I change.
As it turns out Vic has actually only had a few beers and he does in fact just get really hyper when he gets excited. Somehow, he is excited about my set, which kind of blows my mind. I find out Vic, Tony and Jamie work in a music store together a few blocks away, which I didn't even know existed and Vic's brother, Mike, is a session drummer. The three of them have been trying to convince Vic to sing in the band they've been wanting to start up, and he finally said yes today, so they are celebrating.
"Can I hear you sing one day?" I ask him and he blushes but nods nonetheless.
"Maybe you can come to one of our practices, when we get this thing going, give us your opinion."
"That'd be awesome."
"You two have really similar voices, actually."
"What, do people think you sing like a girl too?" I joke and he laughs but he's nodding.
"Basically. Girls seem to be into it though."
"Too bad you aren't into girls." Mike says and my heart seems to jump right into my throat. He's gay, holy fuck. I could have a chance here, that is if I ever get up the courage. It did after all take me two years to find out his name, and that hadn't exactly been my own doing.
"Yeah, sadly boys don't seem to feel the same."
"I'm into you." I blurt and even as i'm saying it my eyes are going wide with shock because what the fuck, since when did I say shit like that? So much for trying to pluck up the courage, now everybody is quite aware of my feelings for Vic. Everyone else at the table seems to find my words hilarious and start to make a right scene out of it, laughing their asses off while Vic and I just sit there, both blushing and avoiding looking at each other. I bite my lip, wishing i'd just be swallowed up by a black hole. Vic nudges my shoulder making me look over at him and he's blushing still but there's a smile on his face.
"I like you too." He tells me before he presses his lips to my cheek. I'm kind of freaking out and having heart palpitations or something but somehow, everything is ok. Vic likes me, how the hell did that happen? I think that may make me the luckiest man alive.
"I've liked you for years." I admit, kind of forgetting there is even other people in our company because Vic likes me. Cute Mexican boy, who I have been crushing over for years actually likes me.
"Do you put extra ice cream in my milkshake?"
"Maybe."
"I knew it!"
"Man, if you two weren't so shy you'd probably be in a civil union having little adopted babies by now. Vic has seriously been going on about 'Kellin, the adorable coffee shop boy' for years now." Tony says.
"Vic's the 'cute Mexican boy'." Maud tells everyone, just to make me embarrassed but I don't even mind, because Vic likes me and he thinks i'm adorable and he talks about me and seriously, nothing can get better than this.
"Do you want to come to my apartment?" Vic asks boldly, this look in his eyes as I turn to him that i'd never seen before but that kind of drives me crazy.
"Yes. Definitely. I definitely want to do that."
"Be safe, kids." Tony says as he snickers.
"Don't be late to work tomorrow otherwise i'll know how to find you." Maud tells me. If it had been with anyone else I probably would've made her go and catch a cab home now but I knew they would take good care of her and get her home safely so I leave her with Vic's friends. Vic weaves his arm under around my back supportively as he helps me walk and having him so close sends shivers down my spine. Maybe I don't fuck everything in my life up.